Wednesday, November 01, 2006

NaNoWriMo

Today is the first day of NaNoWriMo, or National Novel Writing Month. While we recognize that not everyone has the time or the inclination to sit down and write 50,000 words over the next thirty days, we do hope that students and faculty will join with us in celebrating this fabulous grassroots idea.

Because even if you're not plugging away to write your 1,667 each day (approximately 5.8 pages) to meet that November 30th deadline, you can still appreciate that a novel can be written by anyone, and — in fact — has been. Great novels are the curious synthesis of craft and luck, of careful storytelling and the ability to plug into the cultural consciousness beyond the immediate contemporary zeitgeist. But not every book needs to be worth of entry into the canon. Books and the reading of books should also be fun and flighty, charming and effortless.

And we hope that NaNoWriMo will help people realize that writing can be something that pours from one, without "the endless tweaking and editing" that not only comes with novel writing, but with school work. That one can get into the habit and the zone of letting language pour forth. And since NaNoWriMo shows us that anyone can be a novelist, we should remember that books are not sacred, and that reading should not be a chore.

Books that have interesting or accessible stories about how or by whom they were written are on display in the library. Please share your suggestions as to books about writing, books about authors, and books with interesting stories about them in the comments.